Nvidia to buy AI chip startup Groq for $20 billion, CNBC reports

Dec 24 (Reuters) – Nvidia has agreed to buy Groq, a designer of ​high-performance artificial intelligence accelerator chips, ‌for $20 billion in cash, CNBC reported on Wednesday.

While the ‌acquisition includes all of Groq’s assets, its nascent Groq cloud business is not part of the deal, the report ⁠said, citing Alex ‌Davis, CEO of Disruptive, which led the startup’s latest financing ‍round.

Groq is a chip startup founded by Jonathan Ross and specializes in producing AI inference ​chips designed to optimize pre-trained models.

The ‌company more than doubled its valuation to $6.9 billion, from $2.8 billion in August last year, following a $750 million funding round in September.

A deal for the reported amount ⁠would mark the largest ​acquisition by Nvidia following ​its $6.9 billion deal for Mellanox Technologies.

Groq is expected to alert its ‍investors about ⁠the deal later in the day, CNBC reported.

Nvidia and Groq did not ⁠immediately respond to Reuters request for comments.

(Reporting by ‌Harshita Mary Varghese in Bengaluru; Editing ‌by Shailesh Kuber)